Let's make ourselves anew
by niewypowiedziane
Summary: If you spent your life being a soldier, what do you become when the war ends? After the titans are eradicated, Levi is trying to understand how to be himself in a limitless world.


(1)

_all things are here of him_

_We won, we won, we won all of sudden_, Levi thinks as he wakes up, sitting up violently, head spinning, vision blurry, the taste of bile at the back of his throat. They won. Hanji and Eren and Levi won, and Erwin and all of the 104th and everyone else whether they deserved it or not, they won, he can remember.

They won.

Levi almost let himself be deadly distracted when it happened, he remembers in the darkness of his room, surrounded by cold air and the icy sound of his own ragged breathing; they found a way to reverse the transformations and to stop the Ape from taking over the fucking world and then they killed it and all of the remaining titans were just fighting aimlessly, easy to bring down, suddenly moving all sloppy without a voice of command, and Levi almost let the surprise startle him – kill him – the titan left permanent marks on his legs with its gigantic sharp nails before it was dead and before Levi fell and lay in an ungraceful puddle of blood, staring at the sky, wondering why he was still alive, unmoving like that.

_We won_, he tells himself again, feeling the soft fabric of bedsheets under his fingers, tracing the weaving that is a luxury of peace. He led them to win – after Erwin was injured Levi was all in command and he led them to win, a pathetic little worm on the soft grass, bleeding, voices screaming his name in ecstasy.

The moment they won, a minute after and five and ten and an hour, he is down on the ground, ignoring the leaves of grass tickling his neck, and he is staring at the sky in front of him, clear and blue, with crisp sun shining as if nothing has happened, indifferent to the carnage that took place in its warm embrace.

Levi wanted to ask others if they were okay but they did it first, he could hear their voices shouting his name from afar – still echoing in his ears – voices suddenly full of an foreign range of emotions, voices that he's never heard bearing so much. They found him and touched him carefully and took him back.

He reminds himself he is safe here, safe in his room, safe safe safe. The word feels emptier with each repeat but he doesn't stop; it strengthens the walls surrounding him. Waking up in the middle of the night isn't strange; he sleeps very little. He's always slept very little, a necessity when one is trying to stay alive.

It's a strange thought: the reality isn't worse than the nightmares anymore.

_We won_, he tells himself, straightening his back and swinging his legs down the side of the bed, the tiles of the floor sharply cold under his feet. _We won and everyone is alive_. Not a whole. Alive.

No one is a whole.

Levi's been feeling all the aches and injuries to his body more than ever before, as if something in his mind separating his consciousness from the pain disappeared when the walls crumbled. The detachment was only a survival method – after a whole life of survival he finally feels like – no, he finally _feels_ – and he's surprised it is possible to have humanity embedded into one's being so deeply.

_We won_, he indulges himself, and among all the screams and cries pounding inside his head like a headache there is a trace of voices of a crowd calling his name when they were returning home for the last time, finally successful; forgiving voices.

Suddenly, they almost-worship him and he hates is.

(2)

_from the black pines, which are his shade on high_

Levi knows it won't last long, this state of blissful intoxication with the victory.

He thanks whichever non-existent being for how violent and unspeakably disastrous the war was as he looks in the mirror and sees his face: dark bags under his eyes that won't ever go away a broken smirk that looks alien even to himself, he didn't realize then it creeped up on his face. It's an ugly expression, a hurtful one.

Yet the cruelty of war grants them all one privilege: they won't be condemned or described as criminal or monsters, at least not until the generations that have seen the real monsters are alive. If they had been fighting other humans, it would have been easier to judge. But they weren't fighting _real_ humans. Only monsters.

Easy to look over what the soldiers have become.

People who seem to know how to live without titans are the minority and always surrounded by crowds, as if they were gurus of some sort, holding answers to the mysteries of the universe. People seem to have lost their glorious ideas and fantastic plans for 'when we win' in the shock of reality. People are scared to live by the rubble of the walls even though they know there is nothing out there.

When Levi gets sick of being followed and given too fucking much attention – and no, he's not going to do any speeches or meetings or accept any decorations – he goes back to the military barracks. They are still strangely populated, many soldiers are reluctant to break up their little friend-support groups, finding some kind of consolation in each other. Levi can't understand it well because he's never really felt that, not after Isabel and Farlan.

Hanji is always there.

It's been only a few weeks since they won and titans are already ancient history for her: whatever research Hanji did, it all belongs to books now. She's already somewhere else with her mind, she never stops – just refocuses.

'Hey sourpatch,' she greets Levi from her behind a tower of books but as she looks up at him her smile falls, replaced by a small frown. 'What's wrong?'

'Nothing's wrong,' he says tonelessly, sitting on the spare chair and propping his booted feet on the desk. 'Maybe I missed your shitty face,' he adds just to placate her and not at all because he actually missed it.

'Me-withdrawal must be harsh. I couldn't imagine,' she chuckles, 'it's your own fault that you come by once a week and you don't want to admit you miss having me around all the time.'

'Dream on,' Levi spats but it lacks his usual intensity, he realizes, his own voice sounds strange to him and he's not doing a good job pretending, especially hard in front of Hanji who knows him too well.

'Some admirers stalking you again?' she asks and receives a glare more expressive than any words. 'Yes, I know, you can scare them off fine. Just wondering.'

'Don't you have something better do to than to say my lines for me?'

'Well, _you_ came to _me_, not the other way round,' she teases, and he doesn't bother to reply, trying out the strange emptiness that fills the room. It's not entirely comfortable. He feels somehow obliged to speak, to act, to rush, but he knows it's only instincts of no use, not anymore.

They never had time to taste the silence before.

The good thing about being around soldiers is, they all hurt the same way and they all know how to treat the strained scarred bodies. Levi doesn't protest when Hanji stands behind him and massages his shoulders with strong decisive movements that almost hurt as they make his knotted muscles relax.

At first he couldn't stop – none of them could – but as of today he hasn't worn the 3DMG in two weeks.

'Any crazy research trips outside the walls?' he asks when she's back in her chair, face bright.

'Why, would you be up for one?'

'Anything to escape my _admirers_,' the word drips sarcasm so much Hanji has to roll her eyes at him.

Another good thing about being around soldiers is, they know each other so well – by exposure – that they don't actually need to communicate their thoughts. There are things everyone just _knows_. Like, sometimes you should be left alone with your thoughts, and sometimes you need to be forced to be among people and saved from your thoughts.

'We're leaving next week. Just a few days of recon and collecting samples. We're going to the mountains.'

Most people have never seen the line of hills on the horizon; the walls were taller. Levi has always ignored them, their strange dark silhouettes, almost unreal, and the tall trees in a shade of green he's never seen anywhere else.

'Mhm,' he just hums and leaves the room without a word.

(3)

_and the loud roar of torrents, where he listeneth_

The second night beyond the walls they are surrounded by the greatest storm Levi has ever seen.

He is getting soaked, sitting outside in his trousers and shirt and cravat, barefoot, water falling all over him and tickling down his neck and forehead, sliding down his skin in hectic ripe drops. The wooden steps are slippery and disgusting so he can't rest his arms on them. He keeps his hands knotted in his lap, arms close to his sides, back military-straight, in a way Erwin forced onto him all those years ago, annoyed with Levi's usual tired slouch that apparently didn't speak of a soldier.

'Never wanted to pretend to be one,' Levi told him but he understood well why every soldier's posture is so important. It's about pride and honour and appearing stronger than you actually are, and it's about the government unwilling to give money to soldiers that look like cowering rats. Keeping your back straight when you're about to pass out with exhaustion gives you an inhuman quality, so that little idiotic brats like Eren would wish to become a soldier, too.

It's also saying, _whether I am proud of the things I did or not, this is who I am._

_This is who I am_, Levi thinks, and maybe he should abandon such an illusion. He isn't a soldier anymore. They've all been given the status of a veteran by an official decree, and granted certain benefits and privileges, but Levi doesn't feel like anything anymore.

Nothing to protect from – nothing to fight.

But he's always been a soldier. Always more preoccupied with survival, with the possibility of being attacked or killed or eaten alive in pieces, than with anything else. Like the whole world they've ever known.

Not fearing a monster's face lighting up in the dawning sun is strange: the lightness of the thought leaves Levi dizzy.

He has never noticed how scary nature can be, nature itself, roaring thunders, lightning cutting the sky into tiny pieces, winds blowing through the plains and into forests, bending trees. So many times he has seen the world outside, but he has never _seen _it, he has never thought about it before. Rain could create floods and streams, like the puddles under his feet only huge, dark, deceptive; winds can break trees and pull plants out of the ground, push things up the air and make them fall; thunders could steal all hearing; lightning could put everything on fire that would rage for days, lingering underneath the surface, stifled but alive inside dried-out soil.

All the others are inside, candles alight, happy voices like a mutter a tone below the rumble of the wind.

Levi's always been fond of rain, incomprehensibly to others. There was no rain in the underground, feeling the rain on his hands for the first time was a miracle.

Feeling the rain still feels like a miracle, as does its music of thousands of droplets, the sound of softly flowing water.

The rain has always been there, and storms and deafening thunders, yet never so close. Levi realizes, letting himself shiver with the murmur of the thunder-shaken air. They have just never really seen it, too busy being scared and pretending not to be scared; too busy with basic surviving and pretending to live for something more than mere survival.

_The world is truly infinite_, he thinks.

_I am a part of this world_, he thinks.

(4)

_to the vines which slope his green path downward to the shore_

They are back within the old walls too soon; the constant noise and unceasing rush of humans all around gives Levi a headache. He refuses yet another invitation to a post-war meeting and endures Erwins' speech about how he should attend them and have his say because he's earned it.

'I don't give a fuck,' Levi politely replies and goes back to staring at his teacup. His long-injured ankle feels stiff today so he tries to move his foot around in the boot to ease the sore muscles.

'You should,' Erwin says again. Levi presses his lips together in a tight line, barely keeping himself form snapping at Erwin. Saying anything out loud will inevitably lead to saying he doesn't care about _anything_, and he can't say that while Erwin is sitting next to him, the loose sleeve of his amputated arm's side rolled up, exposing pale scarred flesh. Levi isn't cruel enough to say he doesn't care about what everyone has sacrificed so much for.

He's got a cut on his cheek and a split lip and back is still sore after last night.

Erwin is polite enough not to question it in the first five minutes.

'What have you been doing last night,' he states more than asks, piercing blue eyes fixed on Levi's face almost-uncomfortably. Levi stays silent, sipping his tea and focusing on not letting his hand shake; the side of his arm is bruised funny.

They are in an old military building right in the middle of the city and Levi never knew it could be so quiet. He can feel the ruffle of his shirt as he moves his arms, the soft moan of leather when he moves his foot.

'What are you doing to yourself?' This time the question sounds like an accusation.

Levi shrugs. The soft ache feels good when he aggravates it with movement.

'Whoever did this, you could have stopped them.'

Another statement.

'Whoever you allowed to do this,' Erwin stops mid-sentence, as if he had no inclination to continue, almost as if it were a threat. 'Levi, damn, fucking look at me.'

Levi doesn't. Erwin loses his patience a moment later and wraps his calloused fingers around Levi's chin and pushes it up, forcing Levi to look at him. He can see the reflection of his eyes in Erwin's, so damn poetic. He can guess he is looking bad by Erwin's expression.

'I'm not the one to judge a person's nature, I'll leave the fancy analytic fake-talk to Hanji or whoever, but I know you, Levi, and I know why you're allowing this. You shouldn't. You are a soldier – still _are_ – and you chose the lesser evil even though you knew what the consequences are. Most people would run. Don't tell me you're having doubts _now_.'

Erwin's fingers are so warm.

Levi keeps his expression blank and refuses to say anything; he knows Erwin is talking about himself as much as about Levi. The lesser evil in the face of a greater evil.

They sit frozen in silence.

'Just next time,' Erwin finally says, releasing Levi from his grip, 'promise you fight back.'

Being regarded by the world as a hero is wrong. Instead, Levi likes the idea of being punished for his crimes, even if it's in a dark alley and by an illegal group of thugs. There is justice in being the one with his back pressed to the cold surface of pavement.

He nods anyway.

Erwin nods back and leaves Levi to his tea.

Levi sips it until it gets all cold, then he walks through the city to the old outer wall – now a mere pile of rubble, few meters high – and climbs up, then climbs down towards the soft green stretch of plains and hills. Waiting. Inviting.

He sits down on the grass, stares at the vastness and the vastness stares back at him with its empty eyes.

When the sun starts setting down, Levi walks up the rubble and down into the city again and back to the military buildings, not even bothering to hide the slightest limp, holding his head high, the afterimage painting everything green.

(5)

_where the bowed waters meet him and adore, kissing his feet with murmurs_

The trio was the first to move out – strictly speaking they never even came back to the barracks to collect their things. They simply left everything behind and only Armin asked for a few of his book sometime later.

The way they are together, separated from the rest of the world by a fine invisible line, Levi almost envies them. Yet he cannot quite imagine how that would be, saving the world, winning _for each other_. Since he had laid his eyes on Eren he's known, and later he was only reassured in this: none of the three really care about anyone else.

A matter of survival, again.

If you care too much about too many –

For years, Levi just existed. He did what was expected of him to the best of his abilities and that was it. He was nothing but a useful tool and he was fine with it.

The kids find a purpose in each other and it's fucking infuriating to watch because it's so inspired. So unbelievably unfit for the world, the one Levi knows.

Maybe they are how humans should be.

'Good morning, Captain,' Levi hears when he is coming back from the barracks. It's Eren, with his wide smile and too-happy voice, the other two a step behind him. 'You look awful.'

'Thanks for the compliment, shitty brat,' Levi replies out of reflex. He hasn't slept all night. He spent the whole morning sitting on Hanji's spare chair and pretending he's not in pain or deadly bored, and used his best skills to avoid bumping into Erwin again. 'What are you doing around here?'

It's a day-long ride from where they hide themselves in an old cottage outside the city; just them and the trees and books.

'Supplies,' Mikasa replies, the word maybe a note less blank than usual. Levi raises an eyebrow.

'And maps,' Armin holds up a scroll, his eyes bright.

'We're going to the ocean,' Eren says, the smile still plastered all over his face but there is an undertone to his voice that makes Levi shiver inwardly; something haunted and dreamy at the same time, something equally hopeful and exhausted. 'There is a book we used to read back in Shigashina. Armin's grandfather's. It was on the forbidden list so we used to hide with it in the attic,' he stops and shrugs slightly, as if embarrassed with his own rambling. 'It was about the world outside. They say there are oceans. Like gigantic lakes. Endless, reaching the horizon.'

Levi admires how Eren uses the unusual word; there used to be no horizons.

He knows what is coming.

'Hanji and a few other soldiers are coming. Would you join us, too, Captain?'

_I'm neither a soldier not a Captain_, Levi thinks.

'When are you leaving?' he says.

'In three days,' comes the reply.

Levi scoffs; he let them get to know him too well. They are ware they don't need to tell him far in advance, he always knows instantly if to say yes or no.

'I'll come,' he says sharply. They just smile, even Mikasa. Levi can't really remember seeing her smiling like this. Then they salute him, in unison, right in the middle of the street, standing proudly tall.

Levi doesn't salute back, he turns around and starts to walks away – someone follows. One set of footsteps. Eren, annoying as always.

'I know it's a scary thought,' he whispers into Levi's ear, 'none of us have ever seen anything like that. _If_ it is real.'

For how simple the boy appears, he has an uncanny way of understanding people.

They journey in silence for days and days; Eren and Mikasa and Armin laugh in their tent all nights long, when everyone else is sleeping and Levi is sitting outside staring at the sky. They follow the map closely and it takes less than two weeks to reach a land flat and dry, with patches of sand and covered in sun-yellowed grasses.

They halt the horses. Levi takes a deep breath, as if he was about to jump into a battle, and he suddenly notices the air smells strange – almost _tastes_ strange.

_We won_, he thinks, _for this._ For the air to taste salty and for the stirrups to touch their feet in the bare places where gear leather straps used to be.

They trot up the strange sandy hill – Armin cites the name for it but Levi's not listening – and from the top of it spreads an incredible view. The water is dark blue and glistening, surface dancing in slow waves, and it really carries all the way to the horizon, joining with the sky in a hazy line, blue and blue.

Eren shouts something that's not even a word and urges his horse to sprint down the hill towards the water. The animal does, running down strangely through the sand his hooves are sinking into, until it reaches the water and splashes it all around, and Eren laughs, he laughs over everyone else's voices and the mutter of waves and the howling of wind and the cry of birds, he laughs so purely and easily that it should be impossible.

Everyone follows down the sand, dismounting by the shoreline. Levi hesitates longest.

His lungs feel salty and burning.

When Eren finally dismounts, too, he takes his shoes off, rolls up his trousers and walks up to Levi; the others are already half-wet, their childish screams carrying down the beach.

'Come on, captain. You can't back out now.'

'Like I would,' Levi says, taking his boots of slowly and styling his trousers after everyone else. He and Eren walk arm in arm towards the ocean, their footprints marking the sand, the two people that saved the world.

_For what_, Levi asks himself silently. The idea of having a small house and eggs for breakfast every day and sitting in an armchair makes him laugh. The idea of not fighting makes him laugh. The idea of pretending to care about the new government makes him laugh. The idea of writing his biography – damn Hanji for ever suggesting it.

He always fought as if it was the matter of life and death but he never believed he could really win, and when they did, everything fell apart.

'Hey,' Eren says, that strange smile back on his face, not really reaching his eyes – glistening eyes, almost as if he was stopping himself from crying, those shitty emotional brats. 'No brooding allowed on field trips. We should make it rule number one – no, rule number two.'

'What is rule number one then?' Levi humours him with asking. Only a step away from the evermoving water.

'Something about not peeking into other people's tents,' Eren manages to say with a straight face. _Really, really shitty teenagers_, Levi thinks.

But he smirks anyway.

'Figures,' he says, finally taking the step into the water.

The sand it so soft underneath the surface, its shape accommodating Levi's feet perfectly, slipping between his toes, waves flowing around his ankles in an almost-tickling way. The water is as cold as expected.

His lungs still feel like salt and smoke.

'I might have been humanity's last hope,' Eren suddenly says, his voice quiet, 'but you keep forgetting that I would have been nothing without a teacher.'

Levi _has_ _to_ look at the boy: the intensity of Eren's stare startles him.

'All of this comes down to you,' Eren mutters.

Levi looks down at the water around his scarred feet.

'Thank you,' Eren says and leaves, not waiting for an answer, not giving Levi the opportunity to deny or ask or talk back. The brat is really good at leaving the impression he wants, Levi remembers Armin saying, _he always wins that one_.

Levi lets Eren win: he closes his eyes and smiles.

(6)

_and the wood, the covert of old trees, with trunks all hoar_

Levi has never before enjoyed tea like this.

It is ridiculous and he'll never admit it happened but he is genuinely enjoying himself; maybe something is wrong with his head. Maybe it's the months of wandering around aimlessly and the months of not killing anyone or anything, taking their toll.

They are sitting in a tree.

Just like some of the trees they used to hide in, out of the reach of titans, flying around the tops in their gravity-defying manoeuvres. He's wearing 3DM gear and it feels – almost alien, as if he didn't spend over ten years of his life in them, day and night. maybe it feels alien because he can actually feel them; it's not like they are embedded into his skin anymore.

They are sitting in a tree and Hanji is talking about something Levi lost the track of a few minutes back. She lit a fire under the tree, made the damn tea and somehow managed to climb up the tree without spilling it from the pot; Levi could swear she must have been practicing it beforehand.

It isn't one of the trees that were marked with blood, one of those that shaded bare graves of their friends. Just a big comforting tree with cosy branches. It feels safe up here in more ways than one.

Levi knows Hanji can tell he's content with this – happy, almost – the tea and the view and the warm sunshine and all the strange things of life, but this time he wants to thank her. He's never done it before, no matter how much she deserved it, and now he wants to thank her for fucking _everything_ – and she disappears. He only notices when he looks up he realises she's not there; he can make out her small silhouette somewhere down on the ground. Just her and her horse. _Safe_, he tells himself, _not far from the nearest village._

A day out. Rest. Sunshine.

_Tea,_ apparently.

Sunshine.

All excuses for – _ah_. That woman.

It takes a long while but Levi dares to do it.

He carefully puts away the teapot and teacup, ridiculously unfitting up there, takes a deep breath and jumps off the branch, his heart skipping a beat as he freefalls.

He's in the air, twisting, jumping up, almost hovering, dancing, he doesn't have to think – his body goes along with it automatically – he's just there, _flying_, and it feels more natural than breathing.

The trees are waiting, inviting to be his anchors; he lands on the soft grass with his good leg and instantly bounces off the ground in one fluid movement, and three seconds later he's back in treetops. He jumps off a branch in a backwards somersault, sliding between the metal lines, and attaches himself to another tree and another and another, the green shadows flickering in front of his eyes at crazy speed, all melting into one long strip of colour ornamented with details his eyes were taught to notice and distinguish as important; he can barely feel the 3DM gear on his body now, it's dulled to a strange remote strain, soothed away by the cold wind.

When he finally gets out of the shade and lands on the very top of one of the old silver-trunk trees, the sunshine showers him with warmth, and he wipes the pearls of sweat off his temples.

There are small marks and spots of green and brown on his white clothes, probably on his face too.

Levi feels alive.

The whole world, _whole_ world is alive and just there, at his fingertips. He lifts up his arm and lets it wander, tracing the uneven horizon.

He stares at the sky for long minutes, like when he was supposed to die but they won instead. Then he closes his eyes and buries his face in his hands.

For a moment he wants to be one of those sentimental people who cry and say_ the price was too high._ The sole thought makes him laugh though, voice stifled, because he can't imagine those words ever coming out of his mouth. _No price is too high for freedom_, he thinks, _the price paid is exactly the price necessary_.

_But_, he thinks, _they died and I'm alive._

They won for this.

Some died for this.

He would be a fool not to make the best out if it – in fact, he has been a fool. He doesn't have a choice but to live the hell out of his life on this fucking planet.

He gives the sun a smile and gives the distant mountains a nod and gives the faraway ocean a salute – fist to his heart, with conviction he's never felt before – and leaps off into freefall again, landing softly. His horse is waiting, munching on the tall grass calmly and mechanically, as if nothing has ever happened. Levi pats its side, whispering a few words, and mounts up.

There is no wind down on the ground, just a vaguely familiar scent of summer.

~fin~


End file.
